Deb Fischer: 'Hard-core conservative'

Tea party Sen. Jim DeMint backed the wrong horse in the Nebraska Senate primary last week, but he's still poised to pick up another ideological soulmate in November.

Morning Score's James Hohmann flagged an interesting look at the voting record of Deb Fischer, the Nebraska Republican Senate nominee and overnight frontrunner for the seat that Democratic Sen. Ben Nelson is vacating. University of Chicago prof Boris Shor compared Fischer's voting record in the Nebraska state Senate with that of state Attorney General (and former state senator) Jon Bruning, whose double-digit lead evaporated in the days leading up to last week's primary.

The key graphs:

Did Sarah Palin [who endorsed Fischer] get the pick right? Is Fischer the more conservative choice? The answer is yes. Fischer is in 96th percentile for conservatism in the officially nonpartisan Nebraska unicameral, and in the 93rd percentile of identified Republicans. That is, only 7 percent of Nebraska Republicans are more conservative than she in recent years. If her voting behavior was unchanged in the move from statehouse to Congress, she would be somewhere between Jim DeMint (R-S.C) and [Ron] Johnson (R-Wisc.) ideologically speaking. That’s pretty hard-core conservative.

Jon Bruning, on the other hand, is a moderate Nebraska conservative, located close to the middle of identified Republicans in the statehouse. That’s still fairly conservative, something close to deposed Bob Bennett of Utah or Elizabeth Dole of North Carolina.